Cal-Cruz Investigator’s Log Notes

“Towards the end of my [job] interview, the owner asked me if I would be bothered by seeing birds that are not handled properly. Having already seen many dead birds on the ground and parts of their bodies in the machines, I asked if some of the birds get caught in the machinery, and he said yes.”

“When I walked into work on my first day as a maintenance worker, I walked through the facility and saw several boxes filled with chicks who appeared to be suffering—some looked sick, others were visibly injured, a few looked severely mangled but still breathing. I later learned that these ‘discarded’ birds are manually removed from the processing lines, collected throughout the day, then killed hours later. Many become injured on the machines routinely used for processing.”

“On my first day, I also noticed a few dead, mangled chicks under a conveyor belt leading into the area where they are sexed. By the end of the day, I couldn’t even count the number of dead birds on the ground—most of them appeared to have parts of their skin or limbs removed, some had been beheaded.”

“At the end of the day today, the ‘discarded’ birds were being dumped into the eggshell disposal chute, which is routine, but there were so many birds being thrown in there at once today that the system clogged, so [an employee] grabbed a mop handle and started jamming it into the pile of birds, forcing them into the drain.”

“As I was leaving today, I walked by the egg shell disposal chute and heard a bird chirping. I looked in and saw a single chick drowning in water that accumulated near the drain, which I’m guessing was clogged again.

“Every day that chicks are hatched, I see buckets and buckets of sick and injured birds piling up. Some are dead, having been severely mangled or disemboweled but most are alive—barely alive, and suffering from obvious injuries. Their pain is unimaginable; … it’s so heartbreaking….”